December 25th
by zeitgeist21st
Summary: The Christmas special/origin story in where we learn why the Fentons left Amity Park and how Ophelia got her scars. Warning: this story contains blood and murder. Originally published December 25th, 2011
1. Cold and Dark

It was cold, it was dark, it was empty, it was lonely. But then again, when isn't it always this way? He thought he would adjust to it eventually, as he was equally as cold and dark, and it would help him forget everything that had happened to him all those years ago. Years? Has it been years already? In all of his exile, the only thing he has forgotten was the time. Perhaps it has been years, maybe centuries even. Or maybe it has only been days and the dark emptiness dragged out the seconds as if they were years.

He didn't care much anymore, all he cared about was that he had been wronged. From the first day he was gifted with these powers, everything else had been taken away from him. When he tried to better himself, when he tried to get back what he thought he had lost, it just became more things to take away. No, it wasn't when he was given his powers, it was long before that. During this whole time in deep space, he kept looking back into his past. All his pain, all his misery, all his loneliness and heartbreak, could be tracked down to one day. It was the day he met that cumbersome oaf he once had the displeasure of calling friend. Since then all his chances at happiness were dashed. He lost the love of his life and was exiled for years in a hospital all because that big idiot wouldn't bother seeing what he was doing. Then he had children, they too would set out to ruin his life. He had made something of himself, he was finally worth the love of his soul mate and to do the world a favor by putting one fat lummox out of his misery. He had the title, he had the wealth, he had the power in more ways than one. All he needed was a family. He thought he would start one with his love, once he got her husband out of the way. Imagine his surprise, imagine his joy, when he found out that her son was gifted just like him. Someone he could relate to with being different (and in his opinion, superior) to everyone else. Someone he could pass down all of his knowledge and skills. In her son he saw the son he never got to have.

But the boy was much too much like his idiot father. He refused to stand by his side. He instead called him insane to even suggest such a notion. No, he did not call him insane, he called him a "seriously crazed up fruitloop", a little worse than being called insane. He opposed him and became an enemy, set out the foil all plans that would lead him to his happiness. Despite this, he still offered his fatherly affection and guidance throughout their confrontations. The boy refused him every time and set out to humiliate him. Every time. He wanted to give up and take the boy out, but he still wanted a child with his gift. His hopes in such a child were dashed when his child, the child he made from the boy's own genetic structure, had turned against him as well.

He then forfeited making himself happy and thus plotted to make the boy and his family suffer. He had gained power and greater advantages ahead of the boy. He had the whole world, the whole planet Earth in his hands! He was _so close _to success he could almost taste it.

But then he failed.

His only consolation was the fact that he would be the only person alive. And in his books, being alive made you much happier than being dead.

And so he wandered the depths of space, looking at nothing but the dark and cold, with nothing but his thoughts to comfort him. He spent all this time contemplating all the wrongs in his life. The cold made his ectoplasm want to warm itself with hatred, the black emptiness wanted do illuminate the air red with rage. Instead of the loneliness making him better, it only made him worse. His only regret in his part of the Earth's destruction was that it wasn't direct enough for him to see that moron of a man and his son die. They were gone, and he didn't bother to enjoy it.

After a time unmeasured by him, he soon found his path was about to cross the empty space the Earth had once stood. He was tormented by the thought of seeing the rubble that once was his home and mused by the thought of whether or not it had formed its own asteroid belt by now or just added rocks to the original one. He made his way past Jupiter and the asteroid belt and then there, on the other side of Mars, past its two moons, there stood the Earth. It was untouched, intact, the way he remembered it. Its orbit was littered with satellites and space stations, ships flying back and forth between the atmosphere and the Earths surface.

He should have been happy, the planet that he was born in, the planet that he was raised in, the planet that made him who he was and one of the only worlds he knew was alive and intact. He should have been ashamed. The planet had nearly been destroyed because of him. He should of felt these emotions, but he didn't. All he felt was rage. He knew immediately that it was the boy's doing, that he had save the world and defamed him in the process. They must have rewarded him, made him a hero, while he had to hide in the depths of space and live infamously in the history books as the man who nearly destroyed the world. His father may have taken the love of his life but the boy did much worse, he took his reputation.

His ectoplasm boiled against the cold emptiness, the black depths were crimson in his rage. He wanted retribution for all that was taken from him. He wanted revenge for his infamy. And he knew that it could only be paid in blood, and a little ectoplasm, under a specific name: Fenton.


	2. Santa, No Santa

The snow fell without clouds. It looked like the very stars were falling out of the sky and fluttering softly onto the ground. Danny and Sam walked the three blocks from their house to the house of Jack and Maddie Fenton. Danny carried the various presents they had made and bought for their family. Sam held the more precious cargo: their only child. Little green eyes sparkled like emeralds in fascination as little pink lips breathed out white vapor.

"Daddy," said the owner of the lips and eyes, "how come I can see my breath if there isn't a ghost anywhere?"

Danny and Sam laughed at this, adoring their daughter's innocent curiosity. Danny moved his head in order to get a glimpse of the little girl through the many packages.

"Well sweetie, remember when I told you about vapor and condensation?"

She nodded her head, a few strands of raven hair shook out from under her hat.

"Well because your breath is warmer than the air outside, the moisture becomes a vapor you can see."

The little girl contemplated this new fact.

"Does that mean when I sense a ghost, my breath becomes colder than the air or does the ghost make the air colder?"

Sam and Danny looked at each other perplexed, they never thought of that before.

"How about we save that question for Grandma and Grandpa Fenton, sweetie." Danny concluded.

"Okay Daddy." she smiled, brightening the air with her ethereal glow.

"Maybe they'll be so obsessed with the question that they'll forget about the fight." Sam added amusingly.

Danny smirked as he recollected many a Christmas he had spent with his parents constantly fighting over the existence of Santa Clause. He had hated it as a child, but he has come to accept it as a Christmas tradition as he got older. It soon became something he easily ignored, and it helped that they started doing it a little less once their grandchild were born.

They arrived at the door of his childhood home. The little girl's hands reached out from her mother's arms to ring the doorbell. When she found she couldn't quite reach it, Sam leaned over so the little white fingers could press the button through the thick green mittens. Immediately the door was opened with Jack and Maddie on the other side.

"Danny, Sam," greeted the two older ghost hunters, "Merry Christmas."

"Grandma, Grandpa!" cried their excited granddaughter as she reached out to hug them. She phased through her mother's arms and clung to Jack and Maddie in the middle of the air.

"Hey there, little Ophelia," replied Maddie in the middle of the embrace.

"Hey there kiddo," replied Jack as she floated back down. He ruffled her head, causing her hat to fall off and her long black hair to fall past her shoulders. "How's it been?"

"Good, we had this holiday party in preschool and I got a new dress from Grandma Manson for the sixth night of Hanukah. Is Aunt Jazz here yet?"

"Sorry sweetie," answered Maddie "but they won't be here until tomorrow."

"Neither will Valerie, Tucker, or Francis." added in Jack.

"And Dani isn't coming until tomorrow neither." Ophelia concluded with a gleeful smile, "That means we have you all to ourselves."

They smiled back. They all soon entered the house and warm themselves by the fireplace and tree. Danny dumped his heavy load by the tree. As he and Sam arranged them, Ophelia's eyes glittered with the shiny wrapping paper of the mountain of gifts, as any child's would.

"Make sure to leave enough room under the tree for Santa." Jack said to them.

Danny and Sam rolled their eyes as they saw Maddie gear up for their annual quarrel. Ophelia, having spent only three half-remembered Christmases at the Fenton house, was completely oblivious to it.

"You mean you should save room for the presents the others will bring." Maddie said.

"Others including Santa."

"How many time do I have to tell you, he _does not_ exist!"

"And how many times do I have to tell _you_, he _does_!"

"What proof do you have that he does exist?"

"What proof do you have that he doesn't?"

"Jack, there are about two billion children around the world. How is a man of his physique and age suppose to deliver presents for every child I one night?"

"Not all children celebrate Christmas, so you can cut that down to about 500 million children. Then there are the children who have been bad and don't get presents, then there are only 300 million. And then there are the differing time zones, so one night can stretch out to about a day and a half."

Sam leaned into her husband.

"I always thought it was interesting how your dad can be so bad over at statistics and approximations for every month of the year except December."

Danny smiled.

"Yeah, well he's had a lot of years and determination to crunch the numbers."

"Still, that is near impossible Jack. He would still to drive at incredibly fast speeds to get it all done in that window of time. He'd burn up from the friction. And how would he acquire flying reindeer and a sleigh in the first place?"

"Magic reindeer, magic sleigh. He got them when he got the magic that makes him live for so long."

"Do you realize how childish you sound right now?"

Ophelia was enmeshed in their argument when she realized she had heard this before and remembered how they up took most of last year's Christmas Eve over the same argument to no end. She then decided to change the subject.

"Grandma, Grandpa?" she said to interrupt their argument.

"Yes Ophelia?" they both answered.

"Outside in the snow I saw my breath and there wasn't a ghost a round. Daddy said it was because my breath was warmer then the air and made vapor. I asked how we can see our breath when a ghost is around and Daddy said to ask you. So I'm asking you: how can I see my breath when a ghost is around if it's not cold?"

The two ghost hunters looked at each other. Strange how they never wondered about that before. Curious, they decided to go down to the their lab in the basement to find out for themselves.  
When they asked Danny to come down for a few samples, Ophelia and Sam were left alone upstairs. Sam held her daughter as she sat on her lap.

"Mommy, why doesn't Santa give presents to kids who don't celebrate Christmas?"

Sam smiled while trying to come up with a good answer.

"Because some winter holidays don't involve exchanging gifts, and it would be weird if Father Christmas squeezed through your chimney and gave you a doll."

"But we exchange gifts for Hanukah, why doesn't he do it for us?"

"Because it's tough for him to do this stuff in one night, imagine trying to give presents to two billion children in the world for eight nights. And that's if he's lucky enough for the two holidays to fall into the same days."

"And Santa can't split himself like Daddy can?"

"No, Santa is not a ghost, or at least not that we know of. Either way, he can't split himself."

"Oh, then if he's real he really deserve all those milk and cookies."

Sam looked at his daughter curiously.

"Do you think Santa is real?"

Ophelia looked up at her mother with a confused expression.

"Isn't he in the box, Mommy?"

"What box?"

"There was this teacher in one of Aunt Jazz's universities talking about a guy who put his cat in this box."

"Schrödinger's Cat?"

"Mm-Hm, it said that since nobody opened the box the cat was both dead and alive at the same time. If the box can make the cat alive and dead at the same time, then maybe it makes Santa real and not real when he's in there. Is that true, Mommy?"

Sam smiled and held her daughter tighter. She kissed Ophelia on the forehead.

"Yes, yes it is."

The three Fentons finally returned to the living room from their little escapade. Maddie was removing her trademark suit cap and goggles, wiping away the well-earned sweat from her brow.

"We're back," She announced, "And we found out how the ghost sense works. When you sense a ghost, your ice core releases a small amount of cryokinetic energy that lowers your body temperature. This somehow alters the amount of humidity you release in your breath. So when you release a breath of air while sensing a ghost, the cold moisture of your breath mixed with the warmer air of your surroundings mixes and results in the blue wisp of vapor."

Ophelia blinked her glittering eyes in the kind of awe only a child as young as her could have.

"Cooooool" she said in that same awe.

"Jack, Maddie," Sam addressed, " you should hear Ophelia's theory about Santa. It's quite interesting."

They perked up at the words.

"And what would that be?" Maddie asked skeptically.

"She says that Santa Clause is a Schrödinger's Cat. Because we don't have anything to prove or disprove his existence, he's still in the box."

Both Maddie and Jack were taken back at the though of their four year old granddaughter not only knowing but understanding a concept like Schrödinger's Cat.

"How does she know about Schrödinger's Cat?" Jack asked, "That's an analogy for quantum physics."

"She overheard a lecture when she was in one of Jazz's university. I think it is a great compromise for this annual argument. Because neither of us can prove or disprove that Santa is real, he is both real and not real. So you guys can both agree with each other and disagree with each other, or at least agree to disagree."

Danny looked at Sam and Ophelia and then at his parents.

"We couldn't have this big epiphany moment back when I was a kid?"

* * *

After they had their dinner, Danny and Sam decided to let Ophelia open one present tonight for being a good little girl and the only child in the house.

"I know just the gift." Maddie declared and she ran downstairs to the basement. After a few minutes, she came back up with a little blue box in black ribbon, the same color as her trademark hazmat suit. She handed the box to Ophelia, who looked at them with big curious eyes. She held the box to her ear as she shook it. She smiled gleefully, as if she already knew what it was.

"Go on, sweetie," Maddie encouraged. "Open it."

With small hesitance, Ophelia tugged on the black ribbon until it bell from the box. She opened the lid and took out its contents. It was a pair of hazmat goggles with red lenses.

"I wanted her to have a little bit of Grandma Fenton she can carry around," Maddie said to Danny and Sam, "and I thought a locket or doll just wasn't enough of me for her."

Ophelia inspected the goggles and looked through the red lenses. Sam looked down at the girl sitting in her lap and then up at Maddie.

"Are you sure about this? These are your favorite goggles, I have never seen you without them in my life."

"Nor have I." Danny added

"She's very small, and runs around a lot. She might break them."

"Nonesense," Maddie said as she noticed that Ophelia was having a hard time putting them on. She took them out of her hands and adjusted the straps. "These are made to protect the wearer from exposure to the harshest ghostly energy. It can withstand ghost attacks, paranormal experiments, and most of all any invention Jack can cook up."

The three adults giggled at his expense.

"Hey" he protested jovially.

Maddie ignored him and drew her attention back to Ophelia.

"Now Ophelia, I've had these goggles ever since I studied paranormal sciences in Wisconsin University. I wore them when I met your grandfather and at on my wedding day. I wore them even when your aunt and your father were born. They were with me when I made my biggest scientific breakthroughs. Now I'm giving them to you, in hopes that you will have as much success with them as I have."

She put the goggles on. They were much bigger than her, cover half her face. She only blinked twice through the red lenses before they fell off her face and dangled from her neck. Danny and Sam both laughed.

"Maybe when she grows into them," Sam said. She looked down at Ophelia. "What do you say, honey? "

"Thank you, Grandma Maddie." Ophelia said in a sweet yet rehearsed tone, as all children her age had.

* * *

Games were played and stories were told. Eventually Ophelia's eyes drooped and she started to fall asleep on the couch.

"Time to put her to bed." Sam announced as she picked up the small child and carried her to the stairs.

The three Fentons said their goodnights and looked on as Ophelia drowsily waved back before she and Sam disappeared up the staircase.

"It's hard to believe she exists," Jack said "it seems like only yesterday that you and Jazz were that small. Now look at you: full grown, fully responsible adults with kids of your own."

Danny smiled, his eyes still glued to the top step.

"Yeah, I bet you never pictured me growing up to be like this way back when."

"Honestly, I doubt anyone would picture their children receiving superhuman powers under their roof and become the savior of two worlds." Maddie joked.

"But parents do dream to have a child like Ophelia, you and Sam are truly blessed to have her."

"Yeah, yeah we are."

Just then, a knock came on the door. Sensing no ghostly threat, Danny answered it. Tucker was with another man dressed in the fashion of a government agent. Both men looked nervous, Tucker more than the other man.

"Hey Tuck, what's wrong?"

"Where's Sam? We need to get going now."

"Tucker what's wrong? What's going on?"

"Remember that surveillance equipment your station put into the satellites last month? Well, it picked up something heading to Earth."

"What like some meteorites or something?"

"Worse, it had a human heat signature and an ectoplasmic signature."

All the blood drained out of Danny's face.

"Sam? Sam! We have to get going, now! Mom, Dad, can you watch over Ophelia until we get back?"

"Sure son, but what's the matter?" asked Jack.

Danny hardly heard his father calling him. Instead of answering, he went straight to the rack by the door and hastily put on his coat and scarf.

"Fourteen years," he absentmindedly rambled to himself, "Fourteen years and he decides _now_ to show his ugly face again? Sam!"

"Okay, okay, Danny I'm here." Sam said as she rushed down the stairs. "If you keep yelling, you'll wake Ophelia up. Hey Tucker-"

She was cut off when Danny threw her coat at her.

"Come on, Sam, we have to get going. There's no time to lose, he could be anywhere right now."

Sam pulled the coat off her head, showing the deep concern on her face. She placed a hand on Danny's shoulder, getting him to stop for a moment and look at her.

"Danny, what's wrong? Calm down and tell me what's going on."

There in Danny's eyes she saw something she hadn't seen in a long time. That fear, worry and determination she had only seen back when they were in high school, when he had his arh-nemisis threatening his life.

"He's back Sam, Vlad Plasmius is back."


	3. Search

Tucker led them to place Vlad was last sighted, the old mansion he had stowed away in the Colorado Rockies. It did not take long with the help of the Spector Speeder. A team of federal agents met them with camps set up around the house to organize their investigation team. They had ecto-trackers, tracking dogs, nets and cuffs and guns. They had enough weaponry to take down a whole prison full of ghosts just to track down one man.

Tucker led them to one of the larger base tents and directed them to a set of computer monitors. The one he focused on was satellite footage of a blur of magenta light flashing across the sky.

"That's the first shot they got of him." Tucker confirmed, "They contacted me first so I could generate a software that could detect ectoplasmic signatures. Here's the same spot but with the software installed into the camera. See that streak? That's a trace of ghost energy he left when he passed by. We scanned all his old mansions and this one has the most recent trace. It stops somewhere in the house."

Danny looked at the old house. Over the fourteen years of abandonment, it had been completely swallowed by the vegetation that now it looked more like a house shaped shrub rather than a mansion. Despite this, he still remembers the many ordeals he had under that roof. The most prominent was when Vlad took him to make an evil clone of himself. The only reason he survived was his friends and Dani's willingness to see the light.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked in monotone, unable to find an accurate emotion to express.

"The trackers stop somewhere in the lower level, we assume it's his lab. We can't get past the vegetation and even if we did, we wouldn't be able to navigate the house. You've been in there before so you know what to look for and you are able to phase through to actually get there."

At that, two white rings formed at Danny center and crawled up and down until they reached above his head and at his feet. They disappeared replacing the raven haired, blue-eyed twenty-eight year old with the snow haired, green-eyed ghost that the world has come to know as their hero Danny Phantom.

"What do you want me to look for?"

"We aren't quite sure, any signs of recent activity that would let us know what he's been planning."

Tucker handed Danny a set of headphones with a microphone and a camera attached, just like the ones they used as kids except a little more sophisticated. Danny fixed the headset to his ears and turned it on. Immediately, two of the monitors switched on with footage from his camera. One showed normal footage while the other showed a streak of magenta far off towards the weeded house.

"All systems are on line." one of the people at the computers confirmed.

Tucker nodded in confirmation and turned to Danny. The two gave each other a half-hearted smile and a nod, letting the other know that they were ready. Sam placed a comforting hand on her husband's shoulder and Danny's stoic green eyes met her concerned lilac eyes.

"You sure you want to do this?" She said, "Vlad was dangerous before, but fourteen years out in space who knows what he'll do."

"It's okay Sam," Danny assured, "I defeated him before, I can defeat him again. He is my problem from the start and so it is my job to bring him down."

Sam smiled and gave him a kiss for good luck.

"Please be careful."

"Aren't I always?"

With that he flew off towards the house and phased in. The first room he entered was dark and hard to see even with his ethereal glow. Danny generated a ghost ray in his palm to illuminate the room in a green light. It was a large room with bookshelves and a fireplace; invasive weeds entangled everything. Danny could see underneath various pelts and animal trophies adorning the walls and shelves. He then recognized the room as the place Vlad shocked him with the Plasmius Maximus and had his ghostly animal experiments chase him into the woods like big game. He internally shuddered at the memory of being shocked by that device; it was far from fun.

He phased a few floors down until he made it to the room that held the worst of his memories. The lab looked just as it did when Danny fried it with his ghostly wail, which unnerved him dearly. There was no dust anywhere, no plants entangling the walls, no sign of age whatsoever. It looked just as it did fourteen years ago. Worse than that, it looked like it had been recently used.

"Tucker, are you getting this?" Danny said into his mike.

"There has definitely been a lot of activity here recently. There are ecto-traces here no older than a week."

"Why would Vlad take stuff from this lab? I destroyed everything."

Danny made the ray in his hand to make the room brighter. With the extra amount of light he noticed a difference in the lab. There was a great paucity of equipment than he remembered from before. A lot of the walls and tabletops were barren, leaving marks of what was once there.

"Hold on Tuck, it looks like he moved a lot of equipment out of here."

"Turn to your left, there's a lot of ecto-energy there and not all of it appears to be Vlad's."

Danny turned where Tucker told him. All he found was what appeared to be yet another bare wall.

"Looks like it was nothing." Tucker said dejectedly.

Danny's eyes narrowed, he didn't trust it.

"I don't think so." He said as he flew over to the wall. He knocked on the wall and found an unusually hollow spot. He placed his ear to the wall and heard a strange but ever so familiar sound.

"I thought so."

He put his palm to the wall and shot it with a ghost ray. Part of the wall crumbled to the ground, revealing a fully functioning ghost portal hidden inside.

"Tuck, you getting this?"

"Yeah, whatever Vlad is up to he moved his place of operation to the Ghost Zone."

"Great, now we have to deal with the Observants; and on Christmas. If they were hard to work with before, I can just imagine how difficult they will be with the Truce in effect until Boxing Day."

Danny phased out of the house and returned to the base with Sam and Tucker.

"What should we do now?" Sam asked.

"What can we do? Vlad's somewhere in the Ghost Zone right now, under the Observants jurisdiction. I can go over there and deal with them now, but they won't do anything until the end of the Truce."

"Then we should head back before Ophelia knows we're gone, there's no use wasting quality time with her or your parents if we can't do anything about it at the moment."

Tucker's phone rang. He checked the caller ID and smiled before answering the phone.

"Hey honey, how's my boy?"

…

"What do you mean, what's wrong?"

…

Tucker eyes widened in shock, making Danny and Sam very uneasy. Valarie was an officer in the thirteenth precinct in Amity Park; if there was ghost related crime she would be the one taking care of it. Tucker was quite used to his wife's job; being that he grew up ghost fighting with Danny and his main clientele were the police in charge of the Ghost-Human Crime Unit (GHCU) and the Bureau of Ghostly Affairs. At this point, Tucker doesn't react much to anything Valarie would tell him. The fact that he was right now meant something really horrible happened.

Tucker turned to Danny and handed the phone to him.

"It's for you." He said in a distant voice.

Danny told the phone from him and took off his headset to put the phone to his ear.

"Hello Valarie, what's wrong?"

"Danny, you need to get back here fast." Danny could hear her suppressing a sob over the phone.

"What's going on, what happened?" A tone of urgency and panic sharpened his voice.

"We got a complaint about a disturbance at your parents house. I was the first to come in and to find…"

"What, find what? What did you find, answer me!"

It was quite for a while, but not exactly. Danny could hear Valarie release enough stress to speak to him. Valarie was crying. One of the toughest officers on the force, whom he never saw shed a tear in his life, was crying. Whatever happened, it must have been terrible if Valarie was crying.

"Danny, I'm very sorry to tell you this… but your parents are dead. They were murdered and it appears to be by a ghost."

Danny was speechless. His stomach was in knots and he felt like his heart stopped for a minute before starting again and what felt like pumping shards of ice into his veins. He felt a hot tear fall down his cheek, unsure of where it came from. His parents were dead. The people who raised him, protected him, made him what he was today, were killed by a ghost. And not just any ghost, he knew just who it was. This ghost was one seriously crazed up fruitloop turned cold-blooded killer. Then it hit him, they weren't the only ones in the house…

"Where's Ophelia?" Danny said; a cold angry edge was heard in his voice.

Sam immediately pricked up at her daughter's name. She knew this was bad.

"Danny, what happened? What's going on?"

Danny was quiet. He did not seem to hear her.

"Valarie, where's Ophelia?"

"There were signs of a struggle all around the house. There were no clear signs of a winner and not a large amount of blood aside from your parents…"

"Where is Ophelia! WHERE IS MY DAUGHTER!"

His ears were ringing from the amount of blood rising to his head. His anger was taking form of a harsh green glow emitting from his non-corporeal body.

"Gone," Valarie finally said in a hoarse voice, "whoever killed your parents took her with them."

Danny's grip on the phone loosened and he let it drop on the ground. This was too much to take in for him. It was Christmas Eve and his parents were dead and his only child kidnapped. No, not Christmas _Eve_, it had stopped being Eve hours. It was Christmas day, with only a couple of hours away from sunrise.

"Danny," Sam said with fear thick in her voice. Tears were in her eyes as she was becoming overwhelmed with panic. "Danny, what's wrong? What happened, where's Ophelia?"

"He killed them." He said, seemingly unaware to whom he was talking to.

"Who killed them, what happened!"

"Plasmius happened." He said. His voice was shaking with anger, fear, and grief. "Vlad killed my parents…and he took Ophelia."


	4. Not Santa

Ophelia was half asleep when she saw her godfather Tucker with her intuition. She was about to phase down when she felt the emotions in him. She couldn't hear them clearly, her father and godfather, but she could hear the urgency in their voice and she felt the fear and anger in her father. Whatever was going on, it was far from good.

The door slammed and she felt her parents leave with her godfather. She decided then to float down and see if her grandparents knew anything about what had just happened.

"Grandma, Grandpa," she said, "Where did Mommy and Daddy go?"

"Nowhere Sweetie, go back to bed." said her grandmother.

"Why was Uncle Tucker here and why did he leave?"

"It's nothing for you to worry about right now," said her grandfather "Go back to bed."

"You're not telling me something bad. Where did Mommy and Daddy go with Uncle Tucker?"

"We'll tell you in the morning, Ophelia, just go back to bed."

Her eyes flashed, she didn't like it when people wouldn't tell her anything.

"No, I want to know what is going _right now_!" She stamped her foot and crossed her arms, reminding the two of them how young she was.

"Mommy and Daddy will tell you when they get home." her grandmother said, "They won't very happy when they get back when they learn you've been up all night. Go to bed right now or you won't get any presents tomorrow."

Ophelia pouted. She would have protested but she did feel pretty tired, and she really didn't want to upset her parents if what they were doing was as urgent as she felt. And then there were the presents…With a huff, she stomped up the stairs and returned to her bed in her father's former bedroom. She stared angrily at the ceiling, her eyes shining green light to the constellation charts attached to the ceiling. In no time at all, as she only had enough energy to hang on to a strong emotion for only such an amount of time being so small, her eyes dimmed as her lids fluttered shut. Her ethereal glow dimmed only a little as she slowly drifted into deep sleep. Her last thought was of her Mom and Dad, and what would make them so worried for…

* * *

She awoke almost immediately to the sense of an ominous presence. In the back of her mind, she saw the presence as a magenta light. It was something she never felt before and gave her a chill down her spine. She felt it was similar to her Dad, her sister Dani and herself, but at the same time nothing like them. She knew for certain it was definitely _not _Santa: not only was this presence creepy beyond belief, but she also sensed something ghostly in it.

She kept her eyes shut tight, reminiscing of a story she read about a man who would take children's eyes to feed his young on the moon. She then heard her grandparent's voices. They were shouting angrily and it seemed to be directed at the eerie presence. It seemed as though they knew it.

_How would they know it? _

_Where would they know it?_

She knew better than to go down and see what was going on, but her curiosity got the better of her and she got out of bed to check. She turned invisible as she passed the doorway and floated down the stairs so as to make sure no on would hear her coming. When was halfway down the stairs, she stopped and looked through the railing at the scene in the living room in front of her.

The presence was a man in a business suit. He had dark blue eyes that were almost grey-black and a grey beard and grey hair pulled back into a ponytail. Despite the fact that Jack and Maddie had their ghost weapons aimed at him, he had his hands behind his back and wore a confident and arrogant air about him. There was also something else there too, as Ophelia could sense. Underneath the arrogant smile, behind those cunning eyes, there was hatred and anger there. It was white hot with revenge and bloodlust, all of it directed at her grandparents (mainly her grandfather, for some strange reason). Why it was directed towards them, she did not know, but she knew this man's intentions were far from good.

"Jack and Maddie," he said in a calm, cheery voice. "My, have you changed since I last saw you. But I suppose that's what happens when you don't see someone for fourteen years."

"What do you want, Vlad!" Jack said angrily, never once keeping his eyes and his weapon off of him.

Vlad put a hand lightly to his chest in mock distress.

"Why Jack, I am offended. You mean I can't just drop by and see my old friends after a decade and a half of exile in deep space?"

_Friends? _Ophelia thought in surprise of hearing him speak. _There is _no _way Grandma and Grandpa would be friends with a presence like his._

"We are not friends Vlad," Maddie said in a harsh tone Ophelia never heard before, "and as far as I'm concerned, we never were."

The hand on his chest curled almost into a fist, his smile gone with an ever so slight of hurt in his eyes. Though, they seemed to be more out of habit rather then by any real emotional pain.

"Ah my dear, sweet Maddie. Once I would have been truly hurt to hear such words coming from you, but that was when I loved you and had hope for us. I learned to give up such useless fancies long ago when everything was taken from me. And speaking of which, where is that son of yours? I wish to reacquaint with him as well, I have much to catch up with the dear boy."

Ophelia was getting very nervous. He knew her Daddy as well?

"You are not welcome in our house Masters," Said Jack aggressively, "Or do you prefer to be called Plasmius?"

At the mention of the name Plasmius, two black rings formed at Vlad's center. They crawled up and down his body until they disappeared at the head and feet of the creature that replaced him. It had a black beard and black hair shaped upwards in a crescent, similar to pictures Ophelia saw of Medieval Romanian nobility. His skin was a turquoise color and his eyes were red, no pupils or whites, just glowing red holes. He wore a suit similar to her Daddy's but with an opposing white and black color scheme, a tunic and pants set as opposed to a straight jumpsuit, and a white cape with and red interior and a collar that stuck up to below his pointed ears. He smiled, showing his sharp fangs that had replaced his human teeth. Ophelia was scared, as he look like a lot of the monsters in the books Mommy would read to her at night. She was terrified at the thought that this thing was just like her Dad, just like her sister, just like herself.

"I suppose if you won't tell me where he is, then I'll have to lure him out."

He opened his palm and a magenta ball of ghost energy formed in his hand. He threw it at her Grandparents, who just jumped out of the way in the nick of time. They then took aim and fired their weapons at him. He formed a shield in front of him that deflected all of their shots, he crossed his arms and shook his head as if something was funny.

"Honestly, after all these years I thought you would have improved your skills enough to be an actual threat."

He then opened his palm towards the shield. It glowed and absorbed the shots fired at it. Vlad then flexed his palm and the shield fired their shots back at them with a boost of its own energy. It hit both of them square in the chest and knocked them to the ground. He floated across the room and stood over them, watching them groan in pain with fascination. His hand glowed and the two were enveloped in magenta energy and lift from the ground, keeping them separate from each other.

"I'll need someone to lure Daniel out. The only question is if I need the both of you or just one."

He looked at the two of them, seeing which one would be best to take.

"I think just one of you will do fine, don't you? I think I would be so much better without five hundred pounds of idiotic, cumbersome, dead weight."

His other hand glowed in the direction of Jack when he got blasted to the nearest wall by a green ghost ray. The blow loosened his grip and released the two older Fentons from their imprisonment, letting them fall to the ground. Vlad got up and looked in the direction of where the shot came from. The source of the shot, to his absolute surprise, was a four-year-old girl in frilly purple pajamas. Her hand was still glowing from the shot and so were her eyes as they shined through the bangs of her disheveled ink black hair. A familiar pair of red-lensed haz-mat goggles hung around her neck and reflected the glow of her hand with a red tinge.

"Leave them alone!" She said while flying over to give him an ecto-charged punch to the jaw. Vlad grabbed her tiny fist in his, stopping the blow mid-air. He let go of her hand and she stayed afloat, held there by his ghost energy. She tried to break out of it, but she could hardly move.

"My, my, what do we have here?" he asked mockingly, "It looks like Daniel has done _a lot _since I was gone."

He looked more closely at the young child in the air, causing her to shrink in fear. She had ghostly green eyes and raven hair just like her father, but there were traits in her, the fury and strong will, the porcelain white skin with slight rose cheeks, that he could tell belonged to her mother that seemed so familiar to him. Despite the sweet and loving features of the young girl, Vlad was appalled at the site of her.

"Phantom became more and more powerful, gained more and more admiration, and he had the audacity to have a child just to rub it in my face!"

Jack picked up his weapon and hit Vlad square in the chest. Ophelia fell out of his energy field and fell into his free hand.

"Leave her alone, Vlad! You're problem is with us!"

"That is where you're wrong, old friend, my problem is with all of you Fentons. Why is it that you are given everything you want while I get everything taken from me? All I ever wanted: love, a family, power, fame, adoration, you have it handed to you while I have nothing. And _now _you have grandchildren to pass down the family tradition of taking happiness away from good people. Why should Daniel have a child to pass down his ghost powers to while I have nothing? I am more powerful than him, more experienced, better trained than he is. Well I've had it! I'm putting my foot down here and now. I am collecting my dues and taking what is rightfully mine!"

He split himself in two and attacked Jack, one knocking him across with an ecto-charged punch and the other snatching the little girl from his arms. The original absorbed the duplicate once the task was done. Maddie tried to free her by attacking him with a less bulky version of the Ghost Gauntlets. Despite her sub par skills as a ninth degree black belt martial artist, Vlad blocked every attack with ease and knocked her across the room at her husband. During this time, Ophelia tried to turn intangible to slip her way out of his grip. Vlad smiled in acknowledgement of her attempt and tightened his grip on her such that nothing, ghost, human, or anything in between, could get out of.

"I must thank Daniel for donating that obnoxious hero complex of his onto you." he said to the frightened little girl squirming in her arms, "If you hadn't tried to save your grandparents, I wouldn't have known you existed. They would have lived long enough for me to lure Daniel and seek my revenge. But no, you are much better than I have hoped, dear child."

"Let me go!" she commanded angrily, trying poorly to hide the fear in her voice.

He smiled as he lifted Jack and Maddie into the air one more time. He turned Ophelia's head towards them.

"Don't you want to say goodbye to Grandma and Grandpa, dear child?" he asked in a sickly sweet tone, "It is the last time you'll ever see them, after all."

"No!"

His free hand raged with electricity, the same current appeared around Jack and Maddie as they screamed in pain.

"You're hurting them!" cried Ophelia. Vlad laughed.

"Oh no, my dear, that is not hurting them. _This is!"_

His fingers curled into a tight claw. The older Fentons bended in unnatural ways with a disturbing crunch. The screams rang louder, sounding like nothing the little girl ever heard before.

"Stop! Please!" she cried out with tears streaming down her face, she tried to look away but his grip was too strong. She had to endure the whole thing. If she could look up, she would see a deviant and ecstatic smile spread across Vlad's face.

"As you wish." He said.

He fired two powerful ghost rays through their hearts like bullets. Their screaming stopped, their color already lost as blood was dripping from their entry and exit wounds. Vlad released them from the force field and let them drop to the ground with a loud thud. Ophelia was screaming and crying in shock and grief at what she just saw. He cradled her in his arms and petted her head gently, ignoring the bleeding corpses only a few feet away from him.

"Now, now, that's what you get for being a Fenton. But you don't have to be. If you're a good little girl, you won't have to share their fate

Ophelia tried to claw at his face.

"No! I hate you! I want my daddy!" she screamed as she tried to hurt the man who killed her grandparents.

Vlad tightened his grip on her until his glove covered nails dug into her skin. Without any warning, he sent an electric shock across her body. She let out a loud scream in pain before she slipped out of consciousness, falling limp in his arms.

"Well, I'll just have to see if I can't change your mind, won't I?" he said to the unconscious child in his arms.

He flew down to the Fenton's lab in the basement and the two disappeared into the Ghost Zone with the Fenton Portal II.


	5. Crime Scene

When Danny, Sam, and Tucker arrived at the scene they could hardly believe their eyes. There were scorch marks everywhere from the ghost rays that were shot by both weapons and hands. It didn't look as bad as a room would be after Danny's fights, it actually looked like the fight was very short. Sadly, that did not make Danny feel better. He knew his parents well enough that when the welfare of their family was at stake they would not hold back to take down a threat. The thought of them giving their all and Vlad being able to take them both down in such a short time made him turn a sickly pale, even for a ghost.

What sickened him the most was what laid in the center of the room. As custom in homicides, they were already covered under a sheet out of respect and ease. Blood was already staining the white cloth, thick as it was, leaving red spots where the wounds were and the pool creeping out from underneath. Because it was a crime scene, they could not move the bodies in any way so as not to tamper with any evidence. There was no need for any evidence, of course, as everyone knew what happened, but they had to follow protocol to avoid the prominent risk of a mistrial if and when they caught the monster. Under the red stained sheet, they could see their forms broken and misshapen from being dropped from the ceiling. He could tell that they were dead before they even hit the ground, and, by the way the limbs were shaped, they went through excruciating pain resulting in not only fractures by full on bone snaps. These thoughts alone sickened poor Danny to his stomach, and so it was quite obvious that he did not wish to see them underneath the sheet.

Aside from the bodies, there was no sign of blood anywhere in the house. This gave hope to Danny and Sam, knowing that at least Vlad did not kill Ophelia here. This gave them hope, but it did not ease their pain and worries for their only child.

Valerie met the three of them in what had been the living room. By now she had stopped crying and acted like she had not been grieved at all, but her ashen face, red eyes and dark smudges on her face where she wiped off her running mascara had betrayed her facade. Tucker immediately went to her side to comfort, but she brushed him off coldly as if she didn't know him. This was how Valerie always acted on the job, she wasn't warm to anyone unless they needed consoling so as to look professional. Tucker was used to this, and he didn't mind it at all. This was because he understood why. Valerie is the very first head of the Thirteenth Precinct, the very first GHCU department in the world and the only one in Amity Park. She had a reputation to keep and an expectation to set, and you do not do that by weeping uncontrollably at a crime scene no matter who the victim was. Tucker learned to accept that and respect her decision, knowing a loving wife and caring mother would take her place once the day was done and she crossed the threshold of their house.

She turned to her husband, or simply Mr. Foley at the time being.

"Do you have that software set up?" she asked him.

"Yeah, its in the Speeder." he replied in the semi-serious tone he always had around her.

"Bring it here, I want to see what exactly happened."

Without another word, he rushed out of the house to the Specter Speeder. Valerie turned to Danny and Sam, her expression lightened and her eyes thawed.

"I'm sorry about your loss, you guys. I wish there was something I could've done to prevent this."

"It's alright, Valerie," Danny said, "I should've known he would do something like this…. I should've stayed here to protect them."

"It's okay Danny, it's not your fault." Sam consoled, just now gaining control of her tears to speak. "You shouldn't beat yourself up about it either, we still have to find Ophelia. Knowing him he's planning to use her to destroy you, and he would need her alive to do it."

"So you think she's not dead?" asked Danny in an upbeat tone, "Do you think he has her alive somewhere?"

"Think? Danny I know. If our daughter was dead, I would have felt it by now."

"How?"

She smiled, showing the warm sweet woman that only her family gets to see.

"A mother's love is a powerful thing."

Tucker returned with a video camera and a screen. He turned on the camera and the screen immediately showed the feedback. The room was covered in magenta streaks, starting from the living room and ending in the basement. The room also had little green streaks all around the room, indicating where Ophelia had been all night. They saw by the traces that Ophelia had waited at the staircase for sometime before taking the offensive and blasting Vlad. That was the only blow she managed to get on him. The traces showed that it took Vlad little time and effort to overpower Ophelia and take her away. Danny and Sam were horrified to find that Vlad and Ophelia had stood right where Jack and Maddie's bodies stood, and the age of the traces matched up with the estimated time of death. This meant that the monster held her and made her watch as he brutally tortured and killed her grandparents. Sam was beyond grief stricken at the thought of what her four-year-old daughter was forced to see, Danny was enraged simply by the fact that the villain had touched her at all.

The freshest traces ended in the basement through the Ghost Portal, confirming their suspicions of where he might have taken her. They may not know where exactly, but they knew they were somewhere in the Ghost Zone.

Danny turned to Tucker.

"Do you know if this thing will work in the Ghost Zone?" he asked him.

Tucker shrugged.

"Never tried it before. Worse case scenario is that the atmosphere would absorb the signatures, but it is very unlikely it would do so in such a small amount of time."

"How so? I would think it would wash it off like a footprint on the beach." Valerie said.

"There's been some research done about the exact properties of the Ghost Zone. We haven't gotten all of it down, but apparently when things like vapors or energy signatures are dispersed it's more like jet streams in the sky or an ink mark on skin. It doesn't wash off more than it just fades."

"Good enough for me," Danny said while snatching the device from Tucker's hands, "I'm going in."

He changed back to Phantom and was about to dive into the Portal when Sam grabbed him by the arm.

"Danny, no!" she scolded, "It's too dangerous to go on your own. We need to get reinforcements."

"By the time we do that, the traces will be gone and who knows how far away they'll be. I can do this Sam. I've fought him more times than anyone else has. I know I can beat him."

"And what if you don't win? What will happen to Ophelia then when she doesn't have her father around to help her when the rest of her powers come in?"

"She may not even live that long if I don't do something, and sitting around waiting for this stupid Truce to be over won't do any good. I promise I'll come back, and I'll have Ophelia with me too."

He gave her a long embrace and a passionate kiss, just like he had given all those years ago in the North Pole. It was the kiss someone gave in case it was the last time they'll ever see them again. Before she could say anything else, Danny flew through the Portal leaving both the room and the Human Plane. Sam was worried, no not worried. There is not a word potent enough to explain what she was feeling for her husband and child, but worried left some clue to how she felt. Tucker put a comforting hand on her shoulder; she absent-mindedly placed her hand on top to acknowledge the touch. Valerie stood next to her and put her hands over her arms. Sam fell into them crying, emotions overwhelming her beyond the capability to stand on her own. Valerie held her gently, like she was her child.

"It will be okay," She whispered, "They'll be back safe."

"You can't be certain of that." she heard Sam say muffled under Valerie's and her own sobs.

"You're right, I can't be certain that they will. But yet I am, and they will be back safe."

Sam stared out into the Ghost Portal. Her tired eyes gave a green halo around the swirling vortex. How could it be so bright when it's hiding something so dark on the other side.

"I hope so."


	6. Little Girl Lost

Ophelia awoke in a bed. She was tucked in and buried alive in pillows. By the fact that she had to brush her snow white locks from her glowing purple eyes, she knew she was somewhere in the Ghost Zone. Her first instinct was to find her parents, specifically her father. He always knew what to do in these situations. When she found the door to the room was locked, she phased through the walls. The halls were poorly lit by flickering candles, leaving her better off with her own ghostly glow to light her way. She couldn't find anyone. Not her father, not her mother, not even her grandparents.

Grandparents.

Somehow, she forgot what had just happened only an hour ago. Her grandparents' lifeless forms collapse onto the ground like broken dolls. The monster, their killer, holding her and making her watch their last agonizing moments, letting her know it was all her fault. She wanted her father now more than ever.

"Daddy? Daddy!"

She cried it over and over; trying every door despite her intuition telling her there was no one there. When she reached the last room on the end of the hall, pitch black and large, she collapsed onto the ground and cried. There was too much sorrow for such a small child to contain.

"There, there, dear child," she heard a voice said, "I'm here. There's no need to cry."

Ophelia's eyes turned to purple flames when she recognized the voice. She turned to the direction of the source just as Masters stepped in, his human shape just barely pulled from the shadows by the little girl's glow.

"Where am I?" she demanded in a stern but childish tone, "Where's my Daddy? I want my Daddy!"

Vlad smiled, showing a rather convincing display of kindness in those raccoon eyes.

"Sweet child, _I'm_ your father now."

"You're not my Daddy!"

His sweet and welcoming smile turned into a stern and serious expression.

"No, I'm not, I'm better than him. I saved you from a disappointing and miserable life with that old family of yours. You have a chance to better yourself and live up to the expectations you were born with, a chance you didn't have with them. Think of all the power we could have together. We can rule over the entire planet as the superior species we truly are." He helped her to her feet, arrogantly believing he already convinced the girl to his side. "If you let me be your new father, I can show you a much better life. With me, you can be the princess all you little girls dream of."

Ophelia retreated. A flicker of fear raced across the little girl's eyes. Most of the things he was saying made no sense to her. He was not her father and he never would be. She did not know _why_ he had done this to her, but she did know one thing. He was a bad man who did terrible things. She would never call someone like him _daddy_.

"I want my _real_ Daddy, I want to go home!"

With only a small smile, he clapped his hands and the room was flooded with light.

"This is your home now."

If Ophelia's eyes weren't already glowing, she would've needed to squint to adjust to the light. She looked around the room, its extravagant pieces of furniture, adorned in gold and red plush, littering it. Tall, lean windows rose practically from the floor to the ceiling, revealing a dark snow-scape that awaited just beyond the glass. Ophelia had only seen such extravagance in storybooks. In them, this would be where the kind and loving king and queen would live, or the rich benefactor who adopted the poor orphaned protagonist. Any child would want to live in a house as beautiful as this, but Ophelia was not any child and knew thi house belonged to an evil person. A fireplace had found itself behind where Masters stood. The flames gave him a sinister glow, reminding the girl of the creature hiding just beneath the surface, the one that killed her grandparents. Ophelia felt very afraid, despite the cozy and warm atmosphere. She did not like this man one bit and she wanted her father to comfort her more than ever.

Though she was afraid, she crossed her arms and feigned childish arrogance. Her father had always taught her to act brave even when she was too scared to move.

"This is not my home," she insisted, "I want to go home."

His smile was gone again, this time replaced with concern. It scared Ophelia how much it reminded her of how her father looked the time she tried crossing the street without him.

"Dear child, listen to reason! Your grandparents are dead. Your parents will be too, _very _soon. No one will be left to take care of you, no one left who has a chance to understand you. You will be left all alone in a dark, cruel world that would rather tear you apart than lend you a hand. I am the only chance you have to survive. This house is the only place you can be safe. Here you can live up to your potential, here you can be loved."

She was quiet for a moment, utterly confused. Confusion then turned into frustration. She shook her head and clawed at her hair.

"No it's not!" she said, stamping her foot firmly on the ground, "This place belongs to a bad man. I don't want to live in the home of a bad man!"

Masters sighed.

"I've taken you from your dull old life and have given you one better suited for someone of your potential. All I want is to be your friend, what else could you want from me?"

"I _want _to go _home_!" she said, sounding like she was on the verge of a tantrum, "I want my Mommy and _Daddy_!"

"Now, now, my child, this may be hard for you to accept, but I am all the family you need. And like a true father, I promise to keep you satisfied and well provided for. You can trust me, I only wish to see you happy."

"Said the Spider to the Fly!"

Masters' face darkened considerably then, but he replaced it with a smile just a quick. He placed a hand on little Ophelia's head, petting her as if she were his newly adopted kitten. She did not like it one bit.

"Such a clever girl you are." he murmured as a proud father would. "I can see it in your eyes. You are just a bit, should we say, _lost_. Your family has destroyed _everything _I've worked so hard to achieve. You see, they made me who I am. It is because of your _pathetic_ grandfather I have become the monster that frightens you so." he said dramatically, feigning to be touched deeply by his own performance. Sensing that this tactic was getting him nowhere, he tried a different approach. He then rounded back onto her, hoping fear would be the trigger to coax the girl to his side. "And I was his friend; a _close_ one at that. Now, imagine what they would do to _you_. Their own flesh and blood. Because of the fact that you were _born_ half ghost, well, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if your parents wanted to experiment on you. It is probably why they left you with your grandparents to begin with. All I wanted, my dear, sweet little girl, was to save you from them. I wanted to take you away before they turned you into something as detestable as me. I admit, I'm quite ashamed of the monster that I am. Perhaps, I just need someone to help me remember my humanity." He said. "Maybe all I truly need is you. Together we can stop your parents from doing the same to you as your grandparents did to me. All you have to do is renounce the name _Fenton_," He spat out the word like the bitterest venom, "And swear to me you _never_ want to see those bad people _ever_ again."

Ophelia swatted his hand away in disgust and took a step back. That spiteful, determined look in the little girl's eyes seemed so familiar to Vlad that he was certain he knew her mother.

"You'rea _liar_! A big, fat, stinky LIAR! My family would _never _hurt me! I'll NEVER leave my Mommy and Daddy! I want to go home, _now_! You're CRAZY!"

Any shred of kindness left his face then, sucked out of him by the black hole that had once been his heart. He grabbed Ophelia's hand. Black rings appeared at his middle and turned him into the monster that took her away from her family. Quick as lightning, Plasmius twisted her hand until he heard a satisfying crunch as he snapped her fragile, little arm. The little girl screamed. She had never felt a worse pain in her life. Cruelly smiling down at the miserable sight, he flung the girl across the room without hesitation. Despite the intense pain, some part of Ophelia remembered her ability to become intangible. She phased through the wall and landed on the other side gracelessly and painfully. She tried to sit up, cradling her broken wrist. She didn't have a chance to see that Vlad had phased through before he blasted her into the wall on the other side of the room.

"It appears I have arrived a little too late. Your parents have already taught you how to be a _horrible, naughty_ little girl. But there's still hope for you, dear child. Ah yes, there's still hope for you _yet!_ Perhaps I should teach you how to mind your manners."

He grabbed her by the bad wrist and shocked her enough that she wouldn't lose consciousness. Her screams peeled and vibrated off the walls that the whole house could hear her pain. Sadly, there was nobody in the house, owner included, who cared in any way about what happened to the pitiful child.

"First lesson-"said the angry ghost as the girl writhed in pain, her heart-wrenching screams still hanging in the air. "_Never_ insult the sanity of your betters!"

Twisting her arm, and losing another scream from Ophelia, Vlad continued. "Second lesson- The next time someone offers you an opportunity better than an ungrateful brat like you deserves, you _take it_!"

For good measure, he twisted her arm again, causing tears to pour from her eyes and even more blood- curdling screams to escape her lips. "Third lesson- _Father_ knows _best_!"

He twisted her arm one last time before tossing the girl to the ground, as if she were a toy he had just finished playing with and had gotten bored of. Whether she was shaking violently from tears or from going into shock, he could not say. More importantly, he did not care. He was just glad to have caused the child some pain. The girl shot up her head and looked at him with venomous purple eyes. Vlad was surprised by the amount of hostility those innocent eyes were holding. Surprised, but not the least bit threatened.

"You. Are. NOT! My. DADDY!" she spat at him between sobs. "I. HATE! You."

He sneered and grabbed her in a choke-hold. He pulled his hand in slowly to cause more pain to the child as

he lifted her into the air. Ophelia struggled and kicked, but she had no hope of winning the struggle.

With a deep, menacing voice, Plasmius asked her "Do you know what happens to little girls who refuse to behave?"

His free hand glowed and the floor parted below her feet, revealing a nest of flowers that coiled their vines and intertwined with themselves like a pit of serpents.

They were the sinister cousins of roses with soft petals that spread out from the middle. They appeared to be delicate to the touch, as roses were, but they stared up at the little girl like the less than welcome cushions of the inside of a coffin. These flowers were a deep shade of crimson-as dark as freshly drawn blood. They awoke from buds that perched upon black vines that were armed to the teeth with lance-like thorns, protruding into every which direction.

"Those are Blood Blossoms, they are an ancient anti ghost remedy. Whenever a ghost comes close to them, it puts them in agonizing pain as is their very being is being gnawed away from the inside out while being burned from the outside. At least that's what I've been told. To this day, we don't what exactly causes them to react so negatively to ghosts. They are thought to have been extinct, I had to go through I lot of trouble to find just one of them and cultivate everything you see below."

He held her closer to his face.

"Originally it was meant for your father, but I believe that this is a far better cause. Until you learn to behave, you will stay in there and let me see just how long a half ghost can survive direct physical contact."

He gave her one last shock to make sure she was too weak to fly and dropped her into the pit. It was a long drop until she reached the bottom. Slowly, the felt the blossoms acting against her body as she approached them. First they were a discomforting tingle as one would get when their limbs fell asleep, but then grew to pickle of white-hot needles. She then felt her stomach ache inside her as if she was sick and it grew and spread across her body with the pain intensifying with every inch. Soon everything hurt, even breathing felt like a twisting stab to her lungs so she dared not scream. Plasmius heard her ear-splitting scream when she finally hit the bottom and was stabbed by the heinous thorns. A new pain overwhelmed her, an inexplicable pain that she never thought in her life existed. This pain was one a person could never adjust to, could never become immune to. Every nerve in her body screamed as it was set ablaze in agony. It was as if her very soul was being stung by burning, stinging, poisonous needles. What was worse, little Ophelia did not even have the chance to fall unconscious and fall into the safe and numb arms of oblivion; the Blood Blossoms would not allow it. They did not feel a child in pain. They felt a ghost and the flowers did as they were created to do: they reached hr soul- the very essence of her existence.

Ophelia was sent into a panic, trying desperately to free herself from the thorns that had now dug themselves deep into her skin. Her frantic attempts at freedom only resulted in the small child becoming entangled even deeper within the vines and thorns. With every kick and pull, Ophelia became completely immersed in the mesh of shining, black thorns and crimson petals. She panicked as she felt the thorns dig deep inside of her, infusing themselves with her skin to reach their chosen target of her soul. All she could feel was the unimaginable pain of thorns of the bloody flowers that mocked her with their beauty and stung her with their velvety kiss.


End file.
